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Date Announced: 05 Mar 2013
Photonics industry group partners with Laser Classroom on outreach activities for schools.
BRUSSELS, 4 MARCH 2013. EPIC, the European Photonics Industry Consortium, is partnering with Laser Classroom for the dissemination of an educational “Light, Lasers and Optics” outreach kit to students across Europe. “We are happy to partner with EPIC and ensure the future generation of engineers so that companies have access to skilled staff end remain creative and competitive,” says Colette DeHarpporte, who founded Laser Classroom in 2008.
The kits, sponsored by companies, cost 195 EUR and are then made available to teachers. National research organizations and photonics clusters work with EPIC to translate the kit into other languages and identify teachers motivated to use the kit in their classroom to excite children about science in general and photonics in particular.
Teachers do not need to pay for the kit, they receive it for free. What is expected from the teachers is to actively use the kit; once a year they need to report back to EPIC how many children used the kit, send a picture, and a testimonial developed by the classroom. Both the kit sponsors and schools using them are listed on the EPIC website and a long-term tracking of the impact of the kits is put in place.
“We want to spread those training kits by the hundreds all across schools in Europe, and we want to measure impact results both in the short and especially in the long-term. There is only one objective and that is to excite children to take on a STEM career direction (Science, Technology, Engineering, Math) so that companies in Europe have access to the talent they need to remain competitive,” says Carlos Lee, Director General at EPIC (pictured).
Instructions are concise, easy to implement, and engaging. Children need to observe, investigate, and discuss. The instructions are downloadable from the website.
EPIC thanks the following member organizations for their support in the translation and identifying teachers to take part in the project: Aston Institute of Photonic Technologies (UK), Chalmers University of Technology (Sweden), COBRA (Netherlands), Fraunhofer IWS (Germany), Haute École ARC Ingénierie (Switzerland), ICFO (Spain), IDIL Fibres Optiques (France), IMB-CNM (Spain), Photonics Cluster Berlin Brandenburg (Germany), Tampere University of Technology (Finland), University College London (UK), University of Birmingham (UK), VTT (Finland).
If you would like to support this initiative and sponsor a kit please visit www.laserclassroom.com/EPIC.
Source: EPIC
E-mail: via web site
Web Site: www.laserclassroom.com/EPIC
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